Opinion

Booth is a busy place full of opportunity. We are often assailed by five or six different options for how to spend our time at any given instant. Classes, recruiting, conferences, leadership opportunities, traveling, social engagements – all of these consume our time. As dutiful Type-As, we are more than happy to fill our plate with as many of these activities as possible, sometimes (usually?) stretching ourselves too thin. But, how often do we make time to stop and reflect on exactly why we are doing these things?

Of course, we have standard answers to this question: “to develop my career,” “to pay it forward,” “to build my network,” “to make a difference,” “for the sake of knowledge,” “to increase my chances for becoming wealthy,” or “to provide for my family,” are a few that come to mind. These are valid, and perhaps sufficient, answers. But if we are willing to go a level deeper, to ask an additional “why?” what will we discover? At worst, we identify a more precise understanding of our life’s purpose and a stronger foundation on which to build our dreams. At best, we may discover a whole new direction that makes our Booth experience an inflection point in our eulogy.

Guaranteed to deliver more than 50 Shades.

Navigating the Grey, an annual talk series designed to help us consider life beyond Booth, will give us a chance to pause and reflect on this question of “why?” This year’s series will take place February 22nd – 25th and will feature accomplished speakers from around the country, such as Dave Evans (co-founder of EA Sports and Stanford’s Design Your Life professor), Barry Rowan (CFO of Cool Planet and former CFO of Nextel and Vonage), and Shundrawn Thomas (Executive Vice President of Funds and Managed Accounts at Northern Trust), among others. These speakers will help us explore this question by addressing topics such as: identifying our purpose, how to avoid wasting our life after business school, finding meaning in our work, and how our life purpose impacts career decisions and the corporate culture we set around us as leaders. The week will culminate in a discussion led by our very own Professor Harry Davis and Charles Newell about the implications of the week’s topics on our legacy.

If this question of “why?” and these topics resonate with you, keep an eye out for the registration details in your inbox in the coming days. This talk series represents a rare opportunity to stop and think deeply in the midst of our busy schedules, so you won’t want to miss out. After all… why are we here and not somewhere else?

Bryan is a Type-A who has taken on a lot of activities and is looking forward to this talk series so he can figure out why he is doing this to himself.

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